The great Portuguese painter Maria Helena Vieira da Silva thanks an enigmatic writer for her book offering "a trip around the world".
Handwritten letter from Maria Helena Vieira da Silva to an unknown recipient, probably a writer.
One page, front and back.
In French.
17 cm x 18.7 cm.
No information about date and location.
Excellent condition of conservation.
Unique piece.
Extracts
(...) Your beautiful book is here on my desk. Ever since it arrived, I have wanted to read it. And every day I leave behind the moment when I could easily travel around the world. I am sure you understand and forgive me. In any case, I did not want to delay thanking you any longer. It is a great work, which has certainly given you much satisfaction, but also, I imagine, much sorrow (1).
(1) here perhaps Maria Helena Vieira da Silva meant to say "effort"?
Maria Helena Vieira da Silva (1908 - 1992) is one of the great painters of the 20th century and one of the few Portuguese artists with significant international recognition. But is Vieira da Silva really a Portuguese artist? She studied and lived most of her life in France, from 1928 onwards, where she helped found the School of Paris. With a figurative style in the 1930s, she evolved to an abstract technique - of lines and labyrinths - that earned her fame and international recognition in the 1950s.
The artist exchanged correspondence with friends, artists, writers and politicians and, above all, the great love of her life, Arpad Szenes, also a painter: one of the most emblematic couples of painters in contemporary art. In addition to expressions of love and friendship, conversations about exhibitions or paintings, other issues appear in the letters, such as Vieira da Silva's health problems and also the existential concerns of the artist, who liked and needed to travel to seek inspiration and a certain happiness.
This mysterious letter subtly testifies to this need and the artist's torments. Furthermore, almost all of the painter's letters were preserved by her family and by Portuguese and French institutions: only half a dozen, owned by collectors, have appeared on the market in recent years.
